Smart Thermostats for Vacation Rentals: Easy Guest Control and Energy Savings

Arguably, one of our biggest property expenses when it comes to utilities is our heating and cooling. Now, this isn't for every property. If you happen to be in paradise somewhere, maybe it's not as important for you, but for most people it is. So making sure that we have a good system in place and an easy to use thermostat for our guests is essential. It's also going to help us save on our utility bills. So this week we're talking about smart thermostats for your vacation, vacation rentals. Thermostats that are easy to use but also help us save a few bucks. If you haven't tuned in well, we've got a whole bunch of episodes for you. You can head over to STR.

We're narrowing down on 200 episodes now. I can't believe it. And quite a few of those. We talk about technology this week. We're going to talk about one other. And we're not talking about smart locks. We're not talking about cameras. Although if you're interested in cameras, go back and check out Epis 149. This week we're talking about smart thermostats, ones that are easy for our guests to use and ones that provide us a lot of control virtually. And I've used a lot of thermostats in my time as a professional real estate investor and with my portfolio, and I'm still using quite a few. But I just discovered a new one. I purchased about a dozen of them. We've installed them, and they're working really well. So I want to share with you what I look for in a thermostat. Why I think these ones are really good. And just a few things about heating and cooling. So first off, heating and cooling is arguably one of our biggest expenses. Whether it's electric, whether it's propane or gas, it can really, really add up, especially if we have cold winters and especially if we have hot summers. And it's also something that we can't get around, right? We can't have a guest check into our property that's too hot or. Or that's too cold. They have to be comfortable. If they're not comfortable, you know what's gonna happen. They're not gonna leave a good review, and it's just not a good situation. So it's really, really important that we have a good heating and cooling system in place. I swear, it feels like every other week, every other day almost. We've been changing air conditioning units at some of my properties across the U.S. it can be a really big expense. Make sure if you're buying a brand new H VAC system that you are depre. It's a capital expense. You want to make sure you're taking your appropriate tax deductions. So if you missed our episode with Tom Wheelwright or Keystone CPA Amanda Hahn, we've had them on before, a lot of good tips there. But it is a big expense and there's not a way around that. So we want to make sure that we're running our heating and air equipment, our H VAC systems, as efficiently as possible. And to do that, we're going to use a smart thermostat. So without further ado, I want to break down the features that I find most essential for a smart thermostat for a vacation rental. The first one is the ability to operate it virtually or from wherever you happen to be. As many of you know, I'm thousands of miles away from most of my properties, South America, where I spend most of my time. And so having the ability to log in virtually is a really, really big plus. It allows us to make sure that the temperature is set appropriately for our guests before they show up. And of course, not all thermostats are like this, right? Any new smart thermostat that you've heard of, Nest or Ecobee, there's a whole bunch of them, and we're going to talk about a couple options and then the one that I use specifically. But there's a lot of smart thermostats out there now, just like there's a lot of smart lock systems, and they're not all created equally. Some are a lot easier to use than others. So I think the first thing that we want to look for is the ability to easily use the thermostat virtually, to be able to log online and make changes if we need to. So another feature that I think is essential, and it comes with most thermostats, pretty much all thermostats these days. But again, you want the ability to be able to operate this function remotely, and that's the auto feature. So let's say you have a guest checking out and you don't have another one checking in for two days. Well, you. You don't want to be heating your property to the max or cooling your property to the max. Why? There's no one there. But you also don't want the temperature to drop too low or to go too high to where it takes too long to bring that temperature back to a comfort temperature before your guest actually arrives. So you want an auto feature to where you can set the thermostat to automatically turn on if the temperature drops below a certain temperature, maybe 65 degrees, for example, or if it goes above a certain temperature, maybe 78 degrees. Now, all air conditioned heating systems are going to cool and heat a little quicker than others, depending on the size of the property, depending on how much space they're actually cooling, and the actual equipment itself, if it's a new system, it's probably going to do a better job than one that's maybe 15 years old. So we want to keep that in mind. We don't want that auto temperature to be too high or too low to where we can't get the temperature back down to a comfortable level before our guest actually checks in. Now, the great thing with these smart thermostats is you can measure that really easily. So let's say there is no guest in your property and you want to change the temperature from 80 degrees, it's in the, in the summer, down to 75 degrees. Well, you could just turn the thermostat on, see how long it takes to go down 75 degrees. You know, how high you can go and how low you can go and still leave yourself enough time to adjust the temperature so that it's perfect when your guest checks in. Another feature that I think's really kind of essential with thermostats, and it's not available on a lot of them, that's the ability to set a max temperature and a minimum temperature. So what do I mean by this? Let's say your guest checks in, it's the middle of the summer, and you're out in the desert in Arizona, and they've been traveling in the car and it's 100 degrees outside. Even though it might be, you know, nice and cool in your property at say 72 degrees, your guests might show up and turn your thermostat down as far as it can possibly go. And one of the things that's going to happen is if they turn it down too far, well, then the coils on your actual equipment can freeze. And so this, this is a common issue. We have guests checking in. They want the temperature to be as good cold as possible, so they adjust that and then it ends up damaging our equipment. So some thermostats, like the one that we're using now, has ability to set a minimum temperature. So you can't go below 66 degrees, for example, or I should say your guest won't be able to go below 66 degrees. Now, 66 is plenty cool for everyone, right? So the ability to set these minimum and max temperatures is a really nice function. It also allows you to, to control your expenses a little bit more, right? 67 degrees, 70 degrees, that's very comfortable temperature. No one really needs to be adjusting it below that or above, you know, a certain 75 degrees, let's say in the, in the winter when it's cold. So by using a thermostat that allows you to set a maximum and a minimum, you can not only protect your equipment a little bit better, but can also save a few bucks on your utility bills, all while your guest is still comfortable in the property. Property. So we want the ability to be able to operate our thermostat remotely. We want the ability to have an auto feature. We want to be able to set a minimum and max temperature. The other thing we want is a thermostat that's just easy to use. So one that has a simple up arrow and one that has a simple down arrow. I own the Nest thermostats. I own some of these Ecobee and modern looking thermostats that I think look really cool. And for me, in my own home, this can work really well. But we have to remember that our guests aren't familiar with our properties. If they're showing up and they're only there for a couple days, and we have some sort of modern thermostat that's a little more difficult to use, some people might have a challenge with that. So an easy way to eliminate that is just use a thermostat that's really simple. And so a standard up down arrow that's, that's about as easy as it gets. The next feature that I really like is ability to manage a whole bunch of thermostats at the same time using a dashboard. So this one might not apply to everyone. If you're just getting started or you just have one or two properties, then it's probably not that much of a big deal. But if you're planning on scaling, all these little decisions become more and more important. So the thermostat that we're using has a great dashboard. You can log in, you can create property groups, you can control everything real easily at your fingertips. And it also only costs about a dollar per unit per thermostat per month or $10 per year. So that's much more affordable than some of the other ones I've seen out there. So let's say you're in the market for a new Thermostat, I think these functions are essential. You want the ability to operate it remotely. If you're planning on adding a lot of units, then you're going to want some sort of management dashboard. You're going to want the ability to set an auto feature. You're going to want the ability to have a minimum and maximum temperature that you can set for your guests that they can't overrid. You're going to want one that's easy to use, that not a lot of people are going to have challenges with. A simple up down arrow I think is probably the best way to go. So the last thing we're going to want to look for if we're in the market for a new thermostat, just to make sure that it's compatible, that it's easy to install, or that someone can easily install it for us. So some of the older thermostats, they might not have what's called a common wire. And if you're in the market for a new thermostat, you just want to make sure that the new one your purchasing has at least the adapter or adapter to easily install the thermostat if all is good. Usually these things shouldn't take more than 30 minutes or so to swap out. So if you're in the market for a new thermostat, I would highly encourage you to make sure that whichever one you go with has all of those functions. Now, I've got a few options for you. I know that they have most of these functions. One is the Ecobee you can get from Costco. I don't think that they have a very easy dashboard to use, at least with a lot of devices. I wouldn't say it's the easiest device to use. It's a little more modern, but we've had guests have issues with that one. It's available at Costco, it's a decent price, looks cool, and it's probably going to save you some money on your utility bill because it operates things a little more efficiently. But I wouldn't say it's the best one in the market, so we're going to get to that one. The second one that a lot of you are probably using or definitely heard about is the Nest thermostat, and that's ran by Google, right? So you use a Google account for that one. And again, that has a lot of the great features that we've talked about. I wouldn't say it has all of them. And again, we have some guests that occasionally have a challenge with that one. It's one where you have to spin and they also don't have an easy to use dashboard if you're operating a lot of properties. Okay, so finally, thanks for sticking with me here. The one that we are now using in all my new properties and swapping out the old ones are is an Emerson Sensi wi fi smart thermostat. It's available on Amazon and probably your local home stores as well. It can range from like 80 to $130. So it's also not very expensive. A lot of these nest thermostats and stuff are, you know, maybe around $200. So this one's actually more affordable and it has all the features that we just talked about. All those features including the low monthly subscription, a dollar per device or $10 per year. You can't beat that. That's pretty good. So if you're out in the market shopping for a new smart thermostat, check out the Emerson Sensi WiFi Smart Thermostat. It's what we've been using. We've installed over a dozen of them in some of my properties. We're swapping out the old ones and they're really easy for our guests to use. It's also helping us save a little bit on our utility bills. And these are the same therm virtual team is making sure are always set at the right temperature. And we can do that for you as well as well as virtually manage pretty much all aspects of your properties the same way that we manage mine. So if you miss some of our episodes on virtual management, go back and check those out. And if you're interested in chatting with us to see if your properties might make a good fit, I'd love to chat with you. You can head to Strict. There's a property management button there. Just a couple quick questions and then we can set up a zoom to chat more. And until next time, I hope you have a wonderful week.

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